Lake lottery employee charged with theft, organized fraud

Ragar, 58, a sales representative for the state-run lottery since 1987, was fired this month after he was charged with organized fraud and seven counts of grand theft in a scheme involving instant scratch-off tickets.

He pocketed more than $4,800 in winnings from scratch-off games, including Gold Rush, Maximum Millions and $3 Million Monopoly, instant games that cost $20 a ticket, according to a probable-cause affidavit.

Ragar, a resident of Howey-in-the-Hills, could not be reached by phone for comment.

The lottery's probe of the scheme is continuing and widening and other arrests are likely, said Donald Mardis, a special agent with the Florida Lottery's division of security, who traced the alleged crimes to outlets in Lake County.

Mardis was guarded about the ongoing investigation but said Ragar used his job as a sales representative to cheat the lottery and sales outlets like Winn-Dixie, which were billed by Florida Lottery for books of scratch-off tickets they never received. Authorities said at least $6,000 in lottery tickets were stolen.

Mardis said Ragar activated ticket books using an electronic key card but never provided the stores with tickets to sell. He then found winning tickets from those books and cashed in the smaller winners at convenience stores in Astatula, Clermont and Leesburg, which were on his assigned sales route for the lottery.

Winning tickets valued under $600 can be redeemed at any lottery retailer without providing photo ID or signing a claim form. More valuable tickets must be redeemed at a district office or Lottery headquarters in Tallahassee.

Owners of Mid Lake Food Mart in Leesburg and KT's Kwik Stop in Clermont, where Ragar cashed more than $2,000 in scratch-off winners, provided investigators with sworn statements identifying the sales rep.

The scheme came to light when an auditor for a retail outlet, Hess Express in Leesburg, discovered that the gas station and convenience store were never given the ticket books for which they were charged about $1,900.

Court documents say a surveillance tape shows Ragar never entered the gas station with the tickets.

Ragar also broke a longstanding rule designed to protect the integrity of the games, according to the allegations. Florida Lottery employees are forbidden from playing the state-run games of chance, said Connie Barnes, a lottery spokeswoman.

The lottery scratch-off games involved in the alleged scheme offered grand prizes ranging in value from $3 million for the $3 Million Monopoly game to $500,000 for Gold Rush, according to the lottery's website.

Lottery officials would not say if any of the stolen ticket books produced top prizes — or if someone else redeemed those winners.

Ragar, scheduled to appear in court July 12, was released from jail after posting bail of $18,000.